


Hemostatic

by StrictlyNoFrills



Series: Magnetic [2]
Category: Roswell (TV 1999)
Genre: F/M, Picking up some of the s2 threads the show writers dropped, Slow Build, Starts after the events in Max in the City, no beta we die like Boromir, or as slow as my builds ever get, polar, s2 AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:55:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29821809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrictlyNoFrills/pseuds/StrictlyNoFrills
Summary: Michael sees a problem and he fixes it. He may not always use the most conventional methods, and the results may raise a few eyebrows, but let it never be said that he is paralyzed by indecision.It’s just Liz’s luck that this time, she’s the problem.
Relationships: Liz Parker & Ava, Liz Parker & Maria DeLuca, Michael Guerin & Liz Parker, Michael Guerin/Liz Parker
Series: Magnetic [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2192226
Kudos: 1





	1. An inauspicious beginning

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn’t expecting to have anything to add to this little ‘verse, but then the Blizzard of 2021 hit and when I finally started feeling like writing again a week or so after it ended, my brain did a 180 on me and demanded that I write Polar instead of working on my Tolkien fics.
> 
> I don’t know what’s happening anymore. I just live here.

An irritating rapping sound dragged Liz out of a pleasant dream about a tall, broad-shouldered guy with long, dark blonde hair. She never could make out the details of his face, but she wasn’t about to complain when the dream had just started to take an interesting turn. She would have appreciated the chance to pursue it, since lately most of her dreams centered around fighting the Skins and the end of the world. Denied that chance, she sat up to search for the source of the intrusion. She met a pair of impatient butterscotch eyes, though it was difficult to make out their exact color in the dark, and stared back blearily.

“Get moving, Parker.”

Liz groaned and scrubbed at her face. “Michael, what-?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Did I stutter? Move it.”

“Do I get to know why you’re dragging me out of bed at-“ She glanced at the alarm clock on her bedside table and had to fight the urge to throw it at him. It would break the window. “6:30 in the morning on a _Saturday_?”

“We’ve got work to do.”

“Work on  _what_?” What could possibly be this important so early on the weekend right after Thanksgiving? Liz would dearly like to know.

“Tess’s dupe-“

“Ava,” Liz said, feeling strangely protective of her new friend, even though the other girl could probably blast her into next week. “Her name is Ava.”

Michael raised his eyebrows again and then lowered them in a minute parody of a shrug. “Yeah, her. She said you’re different now. You contacted Maxwell from thousands of miles away. Did you really think we could find out you have powers now and then just let it go?”

“Didn’t really think about it. I had a few other things on my mind at the time,” Liz reminded him with a pointed look. “And I don't know if you can really describe being able to do what I did as having powers. I didn’t contact Max on my own. Isabel helped. I couldn’t have done that without her. I may be different, but I'm not... like you. I can't do the things that you guys can do.”

“Yet," Michael said, clearly not convinced by her reasoning. "None of us started out knowing how to do everything from day one, and we all specialize in different things." The fact that Michael still occasionally struggled with the volatility of his own abilities remained unspoken but the implication hung heavily and somewhat awkwardly in the air before Michael moved on. "And Max is fine now. But if you don’t get a handle on your new abilities, we might all be screwed.”

Liz rolled her eyes. “It’s not like I’m turning green or giving off sparks or anything.”

Michael leveled her with a look that put his usual unimpressed expressions to shame.

“You’ve been different ever since you were healed. We just didn’t realize it.” At her blank look, Michael raised his eyebrows pointedly. “ Remember when you and Max couldn’t keep your hands off each other and you got all those flashes? You’re the entire reason we found the first orb. We may not have understood what it meant back then, but we do now, and you’re crazy if you actually think you can just ignore that fact and hope it goes away. It won’t. Now get your ass out of that bed, or I’ll drag you.”

That got her moving. Michael was not in the habit of making idle threats. If he said he would drag her out of her bed, he meant it, and that was an indignity Liz definitely did not need. 

She shimmied out from under her covers and told him, “Give me ten minutes.”

“You can have five.”

_Five_ ? “Eight!”

“Six.”

“Give me seven at least.”

“Fine. Time’s wasting, Parker. Book it.” 

He moved away from her window, presumably to sit and wait on her lawn chair, and Liz burst into action, yanking off her sleep tank and shorts and pulling on a pair of jeans, a dark red tank top, and a charcoal grey sweater. After swiping on a bit of deodorant, she dragged her hair brush through her long, dark brown hair a few times, wincing when the bristles caught and she had to work through a few snarls. She pulled on a pair of socks and some sneakers and went to brush her teeth, and then put a bit of lip balm over her lips afterward. A brief trip to her closet to grab her beige Carhartt jacket and her purse and then she glanced at the clock and bit her lip.

Liz used the two minutes remaining to race to the kitchen as quietly as she could without sacrificing any speed. She grabbed two chocolate chip granola bars and a bottle of orange juice which she slipped into her purse. The least Michael could let her do was eat a quick bite before whatever it was he expected her to try today.

Finally, she climbed out of her bedroom window to meet Michael. 

He glanced down at his watch. “You’re late.”

“And you’re a jerk,” Liz said evenly. “What else is new?”

“Cute,” Michael said, turning towards the ladder and starting his descent.

“That’s me,” Liz quipped under her breath as she followed after her drill sergeant.

“Heard that.”

Liz paused and stared down at the top of Michael’s dark golden head. She forgot most of the time that Michael and the rest of the hybrids had sharper hearing than full-blooded humans possessed. Sharper sight and sense of smell, too. Liz didn’t know what to make of their need for sugar and spice in their food. Perhaps that was the one area in which plain-Jane humans had the hybrids beat, but she doubted it was that simple. As for touch... probably best not to think about it, especially right now.

“I don’t hear you moving.”

Liz bit the tip of her tongue against any further rejoinders. She had a feeling this morning would be rough enough without her feeding the animosity.

After joining Michael in the alley, she followed him out to his bike, cursing her lack of forethought at not having her hair braided or otherwise secured. She doubted her task master would want to wait the two minutes it would take her to fish out a hair tie and plait her long tresses, but it was worth a shot.

“Can I do something with my hair before I put the helmet on, or will that put us too far behind schedule?” she asked dryly.

Michael glanced at her hair critically. “No.” 

Of course not. 

“Come here,” he said, but instead of waiting for her to come to him where he sat astride his bike, he reached out and ran his hand over her hair. Liz felt the energy in the air crackle and shift with something that felt distinctly Michael, and when she reached back to feel the changes he’d made, she found a neat fishtail braid. She shot Michael a mildly impressed look. 

“Thank you.”

He held out a shiny black helmet. “Whatever.”

Liz bit her lip against the small smile that threatened to break out, endeared by his gruffness now that she’d gotten one of those rare glimpses of the gentle giant hiding below the surface. Accepting the helmet, she pulled it on and secured the strap. Then she carefully climbed on behind Michael and wrapped her arms gingerly around his waist, remembering all too well how overwhelming it had been to be so close to him the time before. Her heartbeat picked up in a premature bid to escape her chest.

It had been a while since Liz had ridden anywhere with Michael, but that awareness of his every move was as inescapable as it had been the first time.

The events surrounding the New York pod squad had distracted her somewhat from her conflicted feelings, particularly that moment with Rath which Liz had, until meeting his entire group, chalked up to temporary alien insanity on Michael’s part. She should have realized the instant she’d felt the lack of heat, of intensity, of anything she’d come to associate with Michael which had been causing her grief for some time now, that there’d been more afoot than drunkenness, a mindwarp, or a local tribal ritual gone wrong. But she’d been too surprised and then too taken aback by Rath’s unexpected advances to analyze the details too closely. Plus, there’d been the ever-present guilt over what it would do to Max and Maria if the truth ever came out, as well as the pain of still trying to get over Max completely, and basically, Liz had been off her deductive game.

Michael started up the ignition and Liz held his waist tighter, the instinct impossible to fight.

She spent the drive over to his apartment studying her hometown as it was before sunrise and doing her best to think about the barely illuminated desert scenery and nothing more. A handful of people shared the road with them, but most were still sleeping. 

Liz envied them. She’d prefer sleep over this too-pleasant torture any day, and she knew she had not rested nearly enough for whatever Michael had planned, nor for quailing the symptoms of her - she wasn’t willing to call it a crush. She’d had plenty of those when she was younger, and this... was not that. Yet she refused to call what she felt anything more concrete than that either. So, a fascination, then. She’d developed a _fascination_ towards her best friend’s on-again-off-again boyfriend, and it was becoming increasingly troublesome.

She could really use an alien crisis right about now. Pity they never seemed to crop up on command.


	2. Light futility on fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to post it in the first chapter: I don’t own Roswell (1999). If I did, the storyline about Liz being different after her healing would not have been dropped until season three.

Closing her eyes, Liz leaned back against the cushions of Michael’s couch. She lowered her hand to rest on her thigh and shook her head.

“It’s no use. Whatever you might think, I don’t have any powers of my own. And we both have the lunch shift today. We’ve gotta get going soon if we’re gonna have a chance to change into our uniforms.”

The reminder of work, at least, got through to Michael, who had spent the morning making her try all sorts of things he and the other hybrids could do with their powers. At least he had conceded to a quick break about an hour ago when her stomach wouldn’t shut up in a desperate bid for more sustenance than the little she’d shoved down her throat before they’d gotten started. He and Liz had both scarfed down PB&J sandwiches, store-brand potato chips, and Snapple before going right back to the fruitless experiments.

She had discovered during the course of the morning that she could not:

Feel her own power within herself and then cause it to manifest outside her body

Change molecular structures 

Heal the paper cut she’d gotten last night while finishing the homework assignments she’d been unable to focus on the entire time Max had been away in New York

Start a fire

Dreamwalk

Mind warp 

Blow up rocks

Change aspects of her own body, such as her fingerprints

She had seen the little black beetle who’d been pressganged into their little exercise in futility fly off when she had been attempting telekinesis, but she was about 99.9% sure that had absolutely nothing to do with her alleged abilities and everything to do with it being a beetle with better, more beetley things to do.

“Fine. We’ll pick this up tomorrow.”

“Why?” Liz asked, throwing up her hands as her eyes flew open. “There’s nothing to suggest that anything else we try will have a different outcome. Face it, Michael. I don’t have powers.”

“The fact that Maxwell’s still breathing says otherwise. And I’m not gonna stop until we’ve tried everything.”

“What else is there?” she demanded, thoroughly exasperated and worn out. She could understand and even appreciate where Michael was coming from - to a point. But so far as she could see, he was tilting at windmills, and she was in no mood to share the horse. Or something. She felt too frazzled to come up with anything more coherent.

Michael was silent for several moments, his expression grim, before he pressed on. “We haven’t tried to find out if you can form a connection to someone without help.”

Even if Liz had not come to know him so well during the past year, it would have been blatantly obvious how much Michael hated the idea. He looked ready to leap out of the nearest door or window just to get away from her now that the words hung like a noxious, decaying thing between them. His entire body comprised of impossibly tight lines of tension, his mouth a rigid, unhappy line.

It wasn’t actually his discomfort that caused Liz to let out a strangled noise of rejection, though, as awful as that probably made her sound. She had a timeline to protect and promises to keep, and she had no way to safeguard her secrets if she proved Michael’s theory correct and did, in fact, have the ability to forge connections unaided.

“Look,” Michael started, the faintest undercurrent of hurt in his tone that was gone in the next breath, so that Liz could almost believe she had imagined the whole thing; she hadn’t, “I don’t really like the idea either.” 

But clearly, part of him felt stung by her own horror at the idea, even though he would never acknowledge it. 

“If you’d rather try with someone else, I can ask Isabel for help.” 

Max was, of course, out of the question, as his parents had him on lockdown after his mysterious disappearance for several days, which they were too smart to believe he had spent camping with Michael in the desert. How he’d thought that excuse would fly was anyone’s guess. He could go to school next week, and he could go see his therapist, and that was it. Those were his only options, until such a time as Mr. and Mrs. Evans rescinded their punishment.

Neither Liz nor Michael considered dragging Tess into this project, for obvious reasons.

Liz shook her head.

“We don’t need to drag Isabel into this,” Liz said firmly. “And there’s no reason for us to try it at all, really. Nothing else has worked, you know, so there’s no reason to think this would either.” 

She hoped.

Rising to her feet, she scooped up her purse and made her way to the door, praying she sounded like her usual logical, level-headed self, instead of the desperate wreck she felt like as she tried to dissuade Michael from his latest plan.

Based on the pursing of his lips and the narrowing of his gaze as he joined her at his front door, Liz would have to say she’d fallen severely short of the mark.

She’d turned to face Michael as he loped towards her, and now she slumped against the door as he placed his hands on either side of her head, hemming her in.

“What’s with you, Parker?” he asked lowly, his dark gaze intent.

She shook her head slowly, feeling her blood heat and her stomach clench in a way that boded terribly for any connection they might form. In her panic over the secrets of the alternate timeline and her part in redirecting their future, she’d completely overlooked her unfortunate fascination with her laconic companion. As though she  needed another reason to dread connecting her mind with his.

“Um, well, nothing,” she stuttered. “It’s just - we’ve really got to get to work, and I just really don’t think we should try connecting.”

Michael’s nostrils flared as he leaned closer, almost as though he’d scented the lies coming out of her mouth - although it was far more likely that he’d merely seen straight through her pathetic acting abilities. She’d been told more than once, by multiple sources, that she was a terrible liar. 

His eagle eyes bored into her own panicked doe eyes, unrelenting. “You’re not worried it’ll be pointless,” he determined. “You’re worried it won’t. What’re you hiding, Liz?”

When she said nothing, gazing up at him anxiously, he went on, “I know there’s something. Something to do with why you faked sleeping with Valenti?”

She swallowed convulsively and tried to feign indignation. “Faked it?  Faked it? What, like I  wanted Max to find us like that? How would I have even known he was coming? Why would I want him to see something like that? It doesn’t make sense.”

Still searing her with his stare, Michael shook his head slowly. “I don’t know why - or how - you would, but you know what I do know?”

She tried to make a questioning sound, but her airway felt so constricted by fear - not of Michael; never of him, but of him finding out all the terrible things she’d been clutching to her chest for so long - that it came out as more of a squeak.

Something distinctly male flared in his eyes at the high-pitched, choked off noise, something she was fairly certain he should only ever direct Maria’s way, before he pressed so closely against her that his warm breath fanned over her drawn face.

“I’m gonna find out.”

A sizzling, crackling sound rent the air, and several heavy-duty sounding somethings snapped. The front door at her back crashed to the ground, causing Liz to stumble as she was robbed of support with no warning. She would have fallen and probably busted the back of her head wide open if Michael hadn’t reached out to steady her in time.

Liz stared up at him in shock. She’d known he was agitated, but she didn’t think she had pushed him that far, and he’d never once done anything around her that’d given her cause to feel unsafe. “Michael, why did you-“

“Wasn’t me,” he told her, grim satisfaction lacing his voice as he lowered his grip from her shoulders to her wrists, holding up her hands as evidence. “That was all you.”

As lurid green bolts of energy crackled over her hands, Michael’s porch greyed out around her and Liz felt her world tilt on its axis for what must be the hundredth time since Max Evans healed a bullet wound two inches beneath her rib cage.


	3. Ruminations and worried relations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s been slow at work this week and there’s something up with my Tumblr account, so here, have another chapter.
> 
> There’s no way this updating schedule is going to hold, but I’m gonna enjoy the productivity while it lasts.

For all that Michael’s protective streak could be frustrating at times, in the moment, as Liz’s knees turned to jelly and her head swam, she couldn’t fault him for it. He scooped her up without ceremony and carried her back over to the couch, depositing her with care she probably shouldn’t find surprising.

He strode back to the front door, poking his head out to see if any neighbors had arrived on the scene to inquire after the disturbance Liz’s unprovoked attack on the door had caused. The coast must have been clear enough, as he bent down to pick up the door, fitting it back into place, and began repairing the damage her nascent powers wrought. She watched as he smoothed over the jagged holes from where she’d snapped the wooden structure off its hinges, securing the door to its frame and realigning the closures and locking mechanisms.

Once Liz felt confident they would be left undisturbed, she allowed herself to lose track of Michael for a while, laying against the cushions and giving into the darkness eating at the edges of her vision and the growing ache at her temple.

She tuned back in to the sound of her host talking on the phone.

“Yeah, sorry about that, Mr. Parker. If I’d known, I would have made sure she ate something.” He listened for a beat. “Yes, sir. We’ll be sure to let you know next time.” Another moment of silence. “Yeah, I’ll be there as soon as I can. Sorry, again, about all this.” He huffed a laugh that, to Liz’s bemusement, sounded bashful, and Liz eyes him curiously as he ducked his head and said, “Bye, sir.”

Michael put the phone back in its cradle and turned to face Liz’s inquisitive expression. He pursed his lips and glanced away, clawing at his eyebrow.

“You came over to help me with a Physics assignment and wound up passing out because you skipped breakfast. I made you eat lunch while I called him. Your dad’s gonna come pick you up ‘cause he doesn’t want you riding my motorcycle.”

A little late for that, the tilt of Michael’s mouth and the wry light in his eyes seemed to say.

Not that either of them would ever risk telling Liz’s father that. They didn’t have a death wish.

“Thanks for covering for me,” Liz said, though she cringed inwardly at the thought of all the hovering headed her way. She shook it off, knowing she was lucky to have a father who loved her enough to hover at all. Plenty of people (including her hybrid companion) were not so fortunate.

“Sure. Sarah’s covering your shift. You’re supposed to rest for the rest of the day.” 

As glad as she would have been for the money she would have made from the lunch rush on Saturday after Thanksgiving, when the denizens of Roswell were finally heartily sick of turkey leftovers and desperate for something different, she couldn’t deny that the chance to rest and come to grips with what she’d done a short while ago, and everything that implied about what she might be becoming, as well as the shifting shape of her future, sounded pretty good right about now.

Plus, she knew Sarah, with two small kids and a husband who had interesting ideas about what it meant to be gainfully employed, could use the money from the extra hours and all the tips far more than Liz could.  


“I better get going. You gonna be okay until your dad gets here?”

“Oh, um, yeah. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

“‘Kay.” He pierced her with an incisive look and told her frankly, “Don’t think I’ve forgotten what really caused this. We’re gonna work on your powers until you’ve got a grip on them, and one way or another, I’m gonna find out what you’re hiding.”

As if Liz could have believed, even for a second, that Michael could be so easily deterred. Still, she felt the blood draining from her cheeks at the reminder of the imminent reveal of all her carefully hoarded secrets.

“Just - promise me something,” she said, resigned.

He raised his eyebrows at her expectantly.

“Don’t tell the others. Especially Max, Isabel, and Tess. Please.”

Michael shook his head. “I can’t promise that until I know what it is. If it’s dangerous, we all need to know. And you and I both know, when it comes to our lives, it’s always something dangerous.”

With that, he turned and strode back to the front door. This time, nothing untoward happened to the door, and he left for the diner, abandoning Liz with her thoughts.

She was ‘different now.’

Liz sat up and curled her legs up to her chest, tucking her knees under her chin. “Way to make an understatement, Ava.”

Never before this would Liz have believed herself capable of such destruction. She had always been such a happy, if overly serious and studious, child, and that disposition managed to survive the trials of puberty, starting high school, and even, for the most part, her time spent in the Alien Abyss.

The kind of fear and rage it took to summon that green energy - she had only felt that twice before. Once, when the FBI kidnapped Max and trapped him in the White Room, and a second time when Ava revealed the truth behind Zan’s death.

Changing the timeline - breaking Max’s heart - that had been deeply painful, but she had known (or thought she knew) that her actions would ensure her hybrid friends’ survival, and stave off the end of the world, so she had done it with barely a hint of fear, and only a little anger. (Why? Why did SHE have to make the hard choices? Why did it seem like it was always, in the end, down to Liz? How could Future Max, who married his own Liz, built a life with her... How could he just dump all this responsibility in her lap and expect her to fix his mistakes? And did that mean Liz, herself, was a _mistake_? Should she have stayed dead that day in the Crash?)

But the thought of anyone other than Maria knowing the truth... the thought of everyone knowing... it gnawed at the hole still left in her chest from when she’d ripped part of her heart out and stomped on it.

Beyond that, if Max discovered why she’d pushed him away, there was a distinct chance that he would try to get her back and undo everything she had worked so hard to achieve.

She couldn’t have that.

For one thing, she’d like for all her pain to mean something. The thought of going through everything she’d experienced since Future Max first appeared on her balcony, only for the crucible of the past month to be rendered moot and the world to end again, was anathema.

Liz gagged and swallowed down the bile that rose in her throat, shoving the idea away. She would just have to convince Michael that their friends were better off not knowing.

...And there was another, awful reason she could not stomach the thought of Max forgiving her and pursuing her again. The feelings which crept in while Liz nursed her broken heart, unwanted, unbidden, but undeniable.

Their roots laid in the first days of their group coming together. That initial, intense moment when she stood her ground against Michael in the alley. The day she ventured to Hank’s trailer to warn Michael about Topolsky. The night Michael returned her journal. Little things he’d done over the past year to make sure she and the rest of the group were alright.

If Max Evans had not put a force on her, tying a part of her to him so thoroughly, Liz could easily have fallen into Michael’s orbit instead.

But Max had healed her, connected with her, shown her his soul, and Liz would never be the same.

She lifted her hands, still faintly sparking, and examined them. Max’s one brave, reckless act of compassion had changed all of their lives, but especially her own.

Liz thought back to what Michael said earlier, about the events surrounding Liz and Max’s late night trip to recover the first communication orb from the desert. At the time, she had felt the changes acutely. Couldn’t have ignored them if she tried. She had even written about them in her journal. Why had she, their _resident molecular biology enthusiast_ , simply let those changes go?

The energy popped and snarled along the tips of her fingers, bathing Michael’s living room in that eerie, verdant light.

She’d let the matter go because she had been so wrapped up in all things Max, to the detriment of her own self-awareness. 

Well, no more.

She could not allow that to happen again. Doubtful as it was that there would be any further, life-altering changes to her physiology, Liz still resolved to stop letting her absorption with Max - or Michael, or any other boy, alien or otherwise, prevent her from examining such developments and doing whatever she might need to do in order to mitigate the impact.

Never in her life, prior to that day in the diner last year, would Liz have thought herself capable of ignoring the lure of science in favor of a boy.

Although, said boy’s own scientific implications may have had a hand in her interest, if she was being completely honest. Proof of alien life. Sentient, highly intelligent, emotionally vulnerable alien life. It had been fascinating. Earth-shattering.

A knock at the front door drew Liz from her ruminations, and she rose on somewhat shaky legs, covering her hands with the sleeves of her sweater and jacket.

“Coming,” she called, not wanting her dad to worry about her any more than he already was. She moved slowly, feeling as though the air around her was comprised of molasses, her head still a bit light and fuzzy, the dull ache still difficult to ignore.

Even so, she made it to Michael’s front door without incident, stepping onto the balls of her feet to check through the peephole. 

Yep. One concerned father, confirmed.

She drew back the deadbolt and unlocked the bottom lock before stepping out to meet her dad’s anxious blue eyes.

“Hey, daddy.”

Her dad shook his head, checking her over from head to toe and then drawing her into a hug.

“What am I gonna do with you, Lizzy?” His voice sounded the same as it had when Liz was little, staying up late because her intellectual curiosity led her to look into things too scary for a girl her age, and the shadows on her bedroom wall made her shiver and jump, huddled under her blankets; that warm but worried, and just a little exasperated tone that always reminded her how much he loved her, even when her antics gave him grey hairs.

She wriggled away to shut and lock the door behind herself, feeling contrite. “I know, I’m sorry. I’ve just been a little - distracted lately. They say junior year’s the hardest, and you know, they’re not wrong.”

It was a poor excuse, given that her grades were still almost perfect, but it was the only one she could think of that didn’t involve the complicated relationships and the drama surrounding them that made up her life beyond school.

She knew her mom and dad didn’t know what to make of how distant and unpredictable she’d seemed ever since the shooting. Once upon a time, Liz had been all about planning and organizing life down to the letter. She was still that girl, even though her actions said otherwise to those not in the know. There was no way for them to realize the upheaval in her routine was all down to the alien insanity which had taken over her life. She'd made sure of it.  


Liz was glad of that, even if she wished there could have been some way to maintain their ignorance without damaging her relationship with them.

“Well, as long as it doesn’t happen again,” her dad said, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and leading her to the truck.

“Oh, um, no. I will definitely remember to eat next time and to let you know if I have somewhere to be before my shift.”

He looked down at the side of her face, eyeing her carefully, and then he nodded. “Okay, honey.”

After giving Liz a hand up into her truck, her dad jogged around to the other side and hopped in before pulling out of his parking spot in the apartment complex parking lot.

The drive home was quiet, save for the strains of one of her dad’s Lynyrd Skynyrd CDs drifting through the truck’s speakers, the familiar songs lulling Liz into a light doze until they reached their usual parking spot.

After turning off the engine, her dad got out and helped Liz as she oozed bonelessly out of the passenger side seat. He gently guided her to the back door and up the stairs to their apartment.

When they reached her room, Liz let her purse drop to the floor, kicked off her shoes, and sank down under the covers of her twin bed, not even bothering to toe off her socks or shuck her jacket and jeans.

The stress of the morning and the energy she’d expended had clearly caught up to her, dragging her inexorably towards slumber.

She woke briefly about an hour later to eat some chicken noodle soup her mother brought her, drink some water, and then sink back under.

If she dreamed, she could not remember later what the dreams were about. Only darkness, deep and impenetrable, and then, once she finally resurfaced, a well-known pair of butterscotch eyes.


	4. So, this is just a thing now

“You know, I’m supposed to be resting.”

Though there was a fairly thick window between them, which her mom or her dad must have closed at some point in the afternoon, Liz knew that Michael heard her.

Instead of acknowledging her words, though, Michael waved his hand, unlatching the locks on her window and sliding it open.

He must have greased the window with his powers, as it’d grown squeaky of late, but he was able to open it with hardly any noise at all. Climbing in with all the grace and nimbleness of jungle cat, belying his broad frame, he nodded towards the head of the bed, and Liz frowned up at him for a moment before giving in and scooting over so that he could sit down beside her.

“Take off your boots first.”

He eyed her for a beat, and she stared implacably back at him. She’d gone along with him enough for one day. He could give her this.

Shrugging, he bent down to unlace his second-hand Doc Martins. Liz assumed Isabel must have worked her fashion magic on them at some point, as they looked almost as good as new.

“Feeling better?” he asked lowly once he’d gotten settled. He still smelled of greasy diner food over the scent of his deodorant and the spices and musk that made up his own unique smell. He must have come her way right after his shift ended.

“Uhmm. Still tired, though.” She felt as though she could sleep for a week and still feel the exhaustion lingering deep in her bones. At least her head no longer hurt. She could handle being tired, but she’d never done too well with pain.

“Makes sense after using your powers like that for the first time.”

“That mean you guys felt like this when you first started?”

“No, but we came out of the pods like this. And we didn’t start with the big stuff, like blowing a door off its hinges. Or trying to contact someone from thousands of miles away. Were you tired after you and Isabel sent that warning to Maxwell?”

Liz shook her head slowly, remembering the terror fueling her a few days ago. “Um, no. Not at first. Too much adrenaline, you know? But later, when he called to let us know that he was coming home…”

She recalled the pounding headache Ava had been kind enough to banish for her, and the heaviness that had dragged at her limbs. At the time, Liz put her symptoms down to the aftermath of so much stress, as she’d felt that way before, after other alien-related problems, but also after other, more mundane situations that she’d found stressful when she was younger and the idea of aliens walking among them had been nothing more than an abstract, if somewhat amusing, idea.

“Hmm,” Michael hummed, leaning his head back against the wall.

“What?”

“Just thinking of ways to fix it.”

“And by ‘it’ you mean me,” Liz pointed out dryly.

“Pretty much.”

Liz huffed a laugh. “Thanks, Michael.”

“No problem.”

She shook her head, feeling a rush of fondness for the blunt boy beside her, and then trying to shove that feeling away. Now was not the time.

Not that it was ever the time, she mused, her exhaustion deepening, though for a different reason this time.

“So, um, what have you come up with so far?” Liz asked, partially to distract herself, but also to satisfy her almost endless supply of curiosity.

He made a thoughtful noise. “We need some kind of accelerant. Something to kickstart your powers and get you used to accessing them without relying on adrenaline or other hormones. Based on what you’ve done so far, I think you’re probably gonna wind up being pretty powerful, but waiting until all that power builds up and then spills out at once doesn’t sound like the brightest idea.”

“Um, no. It doesn’t.” It sounded like a terrible idea, actually, especially if the aftermath of such explosions always left her feeling like this. She chewed on her bottom lip, going over their alien assets.

They had the Destiny Book, but other than being written in Antarian glyphs, it didn’t seem particularly special. They had the necklace with the Whirlpool Galaxy symbol. Again, aside from being a symbol of her friends’ heritage, not too helpful.

They had the remnant of the Antarian ship which brought her friends and their protectors here, but Liz dismissed that idea almost immediately. Hal hadn’t given Michael that tiny piece of the ship so that it could be used as a tool. That strange, wonderful piece of Antarian technology was proof that someone had stood up for the tiny lives cradled in the pods when no one else would or could. Someone human. Liz had noticed a change in Michael in the days and weeks after his interview with Hal. Oh, he was obviously still himself, every bit as blunt and intolerant of stupidity and drama as always, but he’d softened towards the people outside of their circle ever so slightly, and he seemed a little less restless for the time when he and his siblings would leave this world behind. Liz wasn’t about to take the talisman of his shifting worldview and experiment with it. She wouldn’t cheapen it in that way.

Her mind strayed towards the pod chamber and the Granilith, but she shied away from the idea. She’d already revealed far too much knowledge of the Granilith as it was. True, she’d shared her concerns with Max, not Michael, but still. She conveniently ignored the part of herself that knew Michael was still after her secrets, and would discover her knowledge of the Antarian artifact soon enough. That left the communication orbs, which Liz was reluctant to use since they’d already sent out a signal to their enemies once, and she had no desire to potentially reach out to even more, since they had enough enemies to deal with as it was, and the healing stones.

They hadn’t been able to revive Nasedo, but then, Nasedo had been dead for a while before Max reached the group, and there’d been more time still between then and the actual healing attempt. She doubted the stones would do any harm if used from something other than healing, so long as the purpose was benign. And she had no intention of trying to blow stuff up any time soon. Baby steps. The idea was to try for baby steps.

“What about the healing stones?”

“That could work. We’re not using them in my apartment, though. Too many incidents like the one from today and my landlord’s gonna start asking questions.”

That was definitely something they didn’t need.

“Okay, so, um. Where should we try it?”

She felt Michael’s shoulder move against hers as he shrugged. “What’s the point of having a pod chamber if we never use it?” he asked, his tone rife with sardonicism.

Her pulse began to pick up, and she swallowed against a mouth gone dry. The pod chamber was far too close to the Granilith for comfort. “What if we just found a good spot in the desert and practiced there? Or maybe in Frazier Woods? That could work.”

“…Or we could just stick with my idea and go somewhere we know no one else will find us,” Michael said, sounding incredulous. “What’s with you, Parker?”

“Nothing’s ‘with me’,” Liz retorted, trying to sound innocent but indignant, rather than anxious. “I just thought it might be good to consider all of our options.”

Michael scoffed quietly. “You know something? Even after knowing all of us and being involved in our lives for a year, you’re still a terrible liar.”

“Some people might consider that a good thing. And anyway, who says I’m lying?”

“Some people’ve never had the FBI on their asses.”

… It was possible he had a point.

“Does this have anything to do with why you’ve been acting so weird lately? Be honest, because as we’ve established: I’ll know if you’re lying.”

“I thought we were talking about places for me to work on my powers,” she hedged.

“And we’ve got one,” Michael said, completely undeterred. “The pod chamber. Now spill.”

Liz tilted her head back, staring up at her ceiling and warring with herself. Should she give in? Should she just get up and go get the water she’d been craving since shortly after she woke up? Assuming Michael couldn’t stop her in time, which was highly unlikely.

But that need to keep her promise to Future Max still throbbed in her chest, keeping the words trapped in her throat. She’d already broken it once by telling everything to Maria, because the secrets had become too unbearable to live with on her own, but Maria was human, and her best friend, and Liz knew that her best friend would never tell another soul. She could be flighty and dramatic and a bit demanding, but Maria was also fiercely loyal, and she knew how desperately Liz needed to keep everything surrounding Future Max’s visit to this point in the timeline quiet. And Michael had never once allowed Maria to give him flashes, nor had he given them to her.

Michael heaved an exasperated sigh. “Any day now.”

A faint scent of smoke and something similar to burnt feathers hit the air, and Michael cursed as Liz began to search of the source.

Her hands sparked with green energy, and below them, her quilt smoked and two dark spots began to spread.

Michael scooped up her hands in one of his and held them away from the quilt and anything else flammable. With his other hand, he put out the tiny fires she’d started and did his best to repair what she’d ruined.

“Alright,” Michael said grimly. “At ease, Parker. Obviously this talk is gonna have to wait until we’re somewhere you can’t do too much damage.”

At his concession to her volatile abilities, Liz relaxed somewhat, and the vivid green sparks died down a little. She had a feeling it would be a while before they went away completely, though.

Her stomach snarled, and she gave a quiet sigh of relief as the perfect excuse presented itself.

“I’m gonna go get something to eat and drink.”

“Probably shouldn’t do that when your hands’re still lit up like the fourth of July. Might make your parents ask some awkward questions.”

“Well, what would you suggest, Michael? I’m hungry, and I’m thirsty, and I’m too tired – and apparently too dangerous – to sneak out and get takeout from somewhere.”

Michael was quiet for a moment and then he said, “Give me fifteen minutes. I’ll go grab some things from the pharmacy around the corner.”

Before Liz could protest, Michael let go of her hands and then rose and shoved his feet back into his boots, making his way back to her window.

Liz stared after him and then shook her head. She looked down at the green currents and tried to will them back inside her skin, or out of existence entirely, but they remained, indifferent to her efforts.

She and her powers were still in a stalemate when Michael returned, bearing two bottles of peach Snapple, a banana, a can of Pringles, two Slim Jims, which she normally found completely disgusting, and a bag of Twizzlers. She shocked herself a little by going for the jerky first, eating both with unexpected fervor. The taste and texture still weren’t her favorite things in the world, but they satisfied something in her.

Michael watched her tear through the jerky with an approving look.

When she raised questioning eyes to him, he told her, “You needed the protein.” He removed the label from one of the Snapple bottles and opened it as she finished the second Slim Jim. He handed the open bottle to her and she guzzled the sugary drink down. When she was done with that, she snatched up the banana, pealing it quickly. She didn’t much care for these either, but in that moment, the banana was the best piece of fruit she’d ever tasted. She frowned down at the last bite of it before popping it into her mouth. “Potassium and b vitamins,” Michael supplied without prompting as he finished peeling the label off of the Pringles can. He took off the plastic top and removed the aluminum seal before handing the can to her, and Liz hummed happily as the first bite full of salt hit her tongue.

She swallowed and said, “Guess I needed some sodium, too, huh?” before shoving another chip into her mouth.

“Yep.”

He started working on the next bottle of Snapple once Liz began to reach the end of the Pringles and passed it over. She sucked that down too and eagerly accepted the Twizzlers which he passed to her one by one.

When she was finally finished, the emptiness that had gnawed at her gut was gone, along with most of the sparks, and Liz felt bone-tired but content. She wanted to sink down under her covers again and go to sleep right then, but Michael was still there, and she desperately needed to brush her teeth after consuming all that sugar.

“Thank you,” she remembered to say finally.

“No problem. Get some sleep, Parker. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Right. Tomorrow. The sparks made a valiant effort to return, but Liz supposed she must have used up too much energy at this point, and the food she’d just eaten would take a little while to hit her system fully.

“See you,” she echoed as Michael climbed out of her window once again.

She pried herself out of bed long enough to pee and brush her teeth, wondering all the while about how she would face the conversation to come.

Probably with some tears, and some fear, and a few fires, she decided in the end. Perhaps it was a good thing they’d be going to the pod chamber after all.


End file.
